On Rad's Radar? - Internet Archives

Florida Broadband Litigation Woes

2013-04-24T04:52:14Z

"Florida Rural Broadband Alliance, LLC (FRBA) is a regional collaboration of local governments, community activists and economic development agencies from rural and economically disadvantaged communities located throughout 15 counties within Florida's Northwest Rural Area of Critical Economic Concern (NWRACEC) and the South Central Rural Area of Critical Economic Concern (SCRACEC)," reads the website for FRBA.

It continues, "The FRBA project will build a new Middle Mile broadband infrastructure, which will link together providers of vital public sector commercial services with private sector non-profit entities for the first time in these two struggling regions of Florida. At this time, only 39 percent of the FRBA region has broadband service. ...At the end of the 3-year build out period, FRBA's project will deliver up to 1,000 times the existing capacity within the coverage area. Doing so will create jobs."

FRBA received a $24 million dollar BTOP broadband stimulus grant in 2010. [Details about the grant are in this case study and on the NTIA site.]Unfortuantely, three years later there isn't anything but lawsuits, federal investigations and accusations.

The investigation into FRBA started in September of 2011. The Columbia County Observer has been steadily reporting on the problem. The real problem: that these rural counties didn't get broadband due to problems large enough to bring the NTIA in and halt payments. This action only precipitated some of the engineering firms to not get paid. One of those firms, Rapid Systems, has been in a court battle with FRBA.

I don't have all these details yet but FRBA, the North Florida Broadband Authority (NFBA) and the GSG, a management firm employed by both authorities were mixed up in the whole grant mess. The Ripoff Report has some serious allegations and isn't far off from the what I have heard. Somewhere along the way $30M was spent by the NFBA - but no paying customers are on that middle mile network that is not completed. Full disclosure: I have consulted with Rapid Systems, the GSG and the NFBA in the past.

It seems like a soap opera with a wrongful termination lawsuit aginst NFBA and now Rapid Systems' litigation against FRBA for $25M!

It will be something I keep my eye on. When the BTOP and BIP programs were launched, many figured the money would not be as productive as the government hoped. These aren't shovel ready projects. They took time to hand out, spin up, and get moving -- but by then how much of the money actually built anything? There is waste and fraud in every billion dollar program. At least this one was investigated early and clamped down on.

Parallels, Cisco, Google and Panda

2013-01-22T04:07:30Z

If every day feels like you are on a hamster wheel, maybe you are examining the wrong metric.

An interesting announcement today two weeks before thier customer summit, Cisco bought a stake in Parallels and gets a Board seat.

Parallels is the middleware for many cloud providers, customers that Cisco would like to sell a lot of stuff through. This might be a response to the cooling relationship between Cisco and VMware, according to reports.

Alltel is completely gone now. AT&T grabbed the leftover assets (customers 500K+ and spectrum) of Alltel for $780 million per VZW's divestiture of Alltel after their 2009 sale.

Google updated Panda again. SearchEngineLand has this to say: "Google has announced a new Panda refresh, making this version number 24. This refresh has a noticeable impact 1.2% of English based queries according to Google. The previous confirmed update was #23 and it impacted 1.3% of English queries on December 21, 2012. Prior to that was a refresh on November 21st that impacted 0.8% of queries. It seems like Google is now rolling out these updates every 4 weeks or so."

Panda is Google's algorithm for search results to " helping people find high-quality sites in Google's search results."

Captive Audience: The Telecom Industry & Monopoly Power

2012-12-31T19:53:50Z

Susan Crawford is a telecom lawyer, professor and activist (among other things). Her book about the last ten years of the telecom industry is out by Yale Press, titled "Captive Audience: The Telecom Industry and Monopoly Power in the New Gilded Age". She recaps the book in this hour long video.

Topics she discusses include a short history of telecom; the lack of competition; the politics of the Duopoly; and the resulting Digital Divide.

Predictions for 2013

2012-12-19T19:15:00Z

CenturyLink Biz has an ebook out with predictions for 2013 and beyond. M2M, mobility, cloud - all just mind blowing stuff . It's prediction time obviously. Let me say that 2013 can go a couple of ways - DC gets its collective act together to improve the financial situation or it doesn't. The economy will swing with either path - good or bad. We have already seen layoffs and threats of more. The only positive I see is bankers actually being penalize for fraud. That said what is in store for 2013?

Well, the FCC's pace for any case is slow and slower, so they will likely not get to the copper clipping and IP transition until 3Q2013 at the earliest. meanwhile, CLEC's have to be vigilante to document cases of copper clipping, because all the money that they - Integra, Megapath, TelePacific, XO, Windstream - have invested in EoC doesn't work without said copper. I think they will be fine until 2014 on this.

That said, CLEC's have to accelerate their plans for OTT services like cloud and Managed IT. When the copper plant disappears, wholesale (from fiber providers and cablecos) will get expensive. The money will be in Layer 7. I have often said that it was going to be Layer 1 or Layer 7. Without a network that you own, it will be a fight for apps and services. Everything will look like Office 365 - where 42,000 Microsoft partners are selling it for very little margin.

Here's the thing: more businesses are moving to the cloud for so many reasons - mobility just being one of them. Some CLEC's, VARs and even Agents will migrate to a cloud services brokerage model. That will work for slinging Hosted Exchange, SharePoint, CRM, simple backup, even VPS. Network will become a separate sale and negotiation.

I'm still shocked that no one has rolled out vertically based integrated bundles yet.

So mobility will still be huge in 2013, but with the new shared data plans, the monthly bill will be increasing, so businesses (and consumers) will be looking for alternatives. Wi-fi will be significant. When you add in mobile data caps and consumer cable caps - and metering - there will be a net effect on cloud services and OTT services.

When you examine the backlash yesterday on the Instagram privacy gaff (right after Facebook finished acquiring them for $715M), you have to wonder how much longer the online phenomenon continues. Privacy is non-existent. You have to be off-the-grid and paying with cash to be beyond corporate and government spying. I think we will see a little more backlash in 2013 - enough that FB and other companies see a dip in usage and corresponding advertising sales. Have FB and twitter peaked?

The companies to watch in 2013:

RIM and Alcatel because they are re-inventing;
Avaya because of its crushing debt;
Bright House due to its Telovations acquisition and to see if it is the first cableco to chase business outside of its region;
8x8 and similar OTT Hosted PBX players like FreedomIQ;
the Cloud Communications Alliance, especially the members who have not been acquired yet. If Hosted PBX doesn't explode in 2013, it never will;
Sprint because Clearwire+DISH+Softbank = a big ugly mess with Hesse;
Verizon but specifically its OTT hosted PBX service, VCE;
Dell as it continues its shift to cloud services from hardware;
Tech Data - between TDmobility and the Microcorp deal - 2013 will be telling;
AirWatch since MDM is huge and they are being sued;
Master Agencies that have to figure out relevancy in 2013.

For Agents and VARs, 2013 is the year they have to put a plan together. No more waiting. Too many VAR's are already jumping on the telecom/network bandwagon and not nearly enough Agents are jumping into the Managed Services and Cloud space. For Agents, 2 resolutions for 2013 would be (1) partner with a VAR or two; and (2) cross-sell services to grab more of the total wallet share of your customers. Look to revenue per customer and lifetime value of each customer as the most important metrics. (Mainly because they are.)

For VAR's, they have seen some big changes from Microsoft - Small Business Server's end of life as well as the way Office 365 was sold. VAR's also witnessed CLEC's - like Cbeyond and EarthLink - make a big splash in launching managed services and cloud offerings. In 2013, VARs will need network/telecom to make up for the revenue dips. Locally in Tampa, we have seen some Microsoft partners go to programming and integration services in place of the old model of SBS and Exchange. For all of cloud adoption, Integration is the key to any business process outcomes. There aren't nearly enough programmers to do all the necessary integration.

In the Google world, there are companies making money supporting and integrating Google Apps. Backupify, Batchbook, Insightly are just 3 companies that integrate with Google Apps for CRM and backup. As this ecosystem becomes more complete, Microcorp's deal with NeoNova could prove brilliant.

It is this type of package or bundle that most businesses want. Do they want stand-alone Hosted Exchange? Notsomuch. They want a complete package of inter-working software - the Hosted PBX integrated with Outlook and the browser - like they have on their smartphone!! It confuses me that the smartphone is more integrated than a laptop, Mac or desktop.

They want their CRM to integrate with all of it too. If Xobni can pull in all that social data, why can't a plug-in for CRM?

It's this complete solution that is needed. No idea what company will roll it out first or if it will be in 2013.

Cloudy Math

2012-12-11T03:10:14Z

There is a lot of talk about the big money that Agents and VAR's can make if they just switch over to sell Managed Services and Cloud Services. Here are some facts about cloud.

M5 had the highest ARPU (average invoice per customer) when ShoreTel bought them - at $2000. Most other cloud communications providers hint at lower ARPU - maybe around $1000 per customer. However, 8x8 and Cbeyond are public and their cloud ARPU sits at between $200 and $250.

When you examine the "cloud services" of many carriers, it is just Hosted Exchange, Sharepoint and maybe some backup. That's $9 + $10 + $20 = $39 per user per month. Add in a Hosted PBX seat at $30 and you are now at $69 per month. For 20 employees, that's not a bad billing invoice for Agents, but it is also an unlikely sale. What small business will pay $1380 per month for phone and email? A PRI at $550 plus maybe $100 for the PBX lease and $50 per YEAR for Google has you covered. Add in some Dropbox and Bingo!

This isn't to discourage you. It's to put a pin in the hype balloon, which is starting to annoy me.

You will have to sell upmarket. There are 83K businesses in the US with 100-499 employees, according to the 2009 US Census (the last year data is available). With 1000 cloud service providers in the US that will be a fun Red Ocean to swim in.

There are only 17,500 business with more than 500 employees. That 's the spot you would like to sell in but you would need to be connected or a white elephant hunter.

That leaves Agents chasing 20-99 employees - since that is a majority of the businesses in the US. Let's call the average 40. If you sell that business the full boat: Internet, Hosted voice, email and backup - the ARPU is worth it. The sales cycle will be longer. The deployment will require more input and project management than Agents are used to. (In fact, it is more than most carriers have ever had to do!!!) Post-sales support will also be required. So overall, it is a lot more work for a stickier client with more ARPU than you are used to. Are you up for that challenge?

Let's go back to the 8x8 example at $256 of ARPU. That's about a 9 employee shop. So you sell them 8x8 voice, cable modem AND another broadband service (like DSL or 4G or fixed wireless). You offer them Google Apps for SMB via NeoNova for some small change. Add in some Mozy Pro back-up (or Carbonite or other backup service that pays you). Next you try to get the cell phones - there has to be a couple that are corporate owned -- for a few more dollars. Don't forget the 4G data plan.

So you wrapped up the Internet Access, mobility, voice, some DR (disaster recovery), backup, email and office suite. After that, what software do they use? How about Conferencing? Do you see? You have to grab the whole wallet (or you can't make much money).

It has to become a lot like McD's. What do they do? A call center hits you first in the drive-thru with, "Would you like to try our ______ special today?" No. "okay. Order when you are ready." But don't forget "Do you want fries with that? or can we Super Size that for you?" It sounds cheesy but you are going to have to do it.

CenturyLink, XO, MegaPath and quite a few other carriers offer transit, Hosted voice and cloud services. It will all be on one bill, with one carrier to blame, with one throat to choke. It makes it easier to sell --- check boxes on an order form or site survey.

You better hurry because the MSP's like MindShift and others are already out there doing this.

When you consider that Parallels AS platform allows hosting companies - like Intermedia.Net - to sell, bill and deploy these services (Hosted PBX, email, storage, office) with a click on an online order page, spend this month - the last month of 2012 - deciding what your plan is going to be for 2013. While I hate the hype, many of your competitors are already targeting your customers. Selling them a T1 will be easy after they sell them VDI or backup or Hosted PBX. Then what do you do?

Again, you have to do it but I wanted you to have a realistic view of what it was going to be like. You have vacuum up the services - all of them - heck, sell them office supplies if someone will pay you for it! Managed Print anyone ;)

Regulating the Internet

2012-12-11T02:07:25Z

While the ITU / UN take over of the Internet was being debunked, AT&T has been making moves of its own. They even have the help of the Astroturf groups as they try to dismantle the copper plant and reassert their Monopoly. (more about that at WSJ)

The FCC is working on two fronts. In one, the FCC formed a Task Force to monitor the transition to an all-IP, general purpose communications network. I say monitor because they won't do more than that.

Quick Aside: It's been 11 years since 9/11 and we still don't have a public safety network yet! That's the H block that they will be auctioning off next year. Whew! Really moved glacial fast there, folks!

I know Regulatory issues are boring - and perhaps you think I am chicken little about this. The truth is if the CLEC industry is threatened, then so is the Agent community. Plain and simple.

Without an innovative telecom industry, how does America stay competitive with the rest of the world? Our Broadband Economy kind of depends on, well, broadband.

On the other front, the FCC is in court over its Net Neutrality rules.

"A federal court is currently considering a case that could determine how much power the Federal Communications Commission has over the primary communications tool of the 21st century: the Internet.... The case, which is before the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, is Verizon's challenge to the FCC's controversial net neutrality rules," The Hill reports.

If the FCC loses the case, all IP will be unregulated. Can you say caps, metered, slow, pricey broadband? It's what the RBOC's hope for.

But does it really matter?

Everything is pretty deregulated now. It's the wild west in VoIP. Everyone with a 486DX computer carcass has slapped on Freeswicth or Asterisk to offer VoIP. It's actually beyond the FCC to enforce it all.

Let's face it - I have proclaimed this before - the FCC is not in enforcement. Sure, a nipple here, a CPNI fine there - piddling stuff when you consider the trillions in investment to form a Duopoly that have decided to NOT compete with each other on any front.

People ask why I dislike the RBOCs so much. This is why. They spend tens of millions each year on lobbying and litigating. For what? They still have majority stakes in all the pies they are in. They could be spending that money on customer care or better broadband. But No! Let's fight the FCC and the CLEC "threat". Not to mention how both of them treat Agents!

When all the information runs on the Internet and we count on 10 companies to supply that network, privacy (what little is left) will be removed from the dictionary.

Meanwhile, Sprint, flush with cash from Softbank, has acquired US Cellular customers and spectrum in the MidWest. Sprint is also in talks with DISH about partnering on DISH's spectrum, a political football at the moment. This just reeks of Clearwire Part II.

Now that T-Mobile is getting the iPhone (5S with NFC maybe?), and perhaps MetroPCS, will it catch up to Sprint? And even if it does, combined Sprint and T-Mobile with MetroPCS (56.4M+42.5M) - throw in Leap and Clearwire too - are smaller than VZW (with 108.7M).

Another interesting tale is the Avaya Debt which cost the CFO there his job.

It's About Stats and Studies

2012-12-04T16:34:50Z

Here is a collection of some stats and studies for your reading pleasure.

(1)

Mary Meeker's 2012 Presentation On The State Of The Web is a good read despite being heavily mobile. She spends quite a few slides pointing out how SO many industries have been disrupted side-swiped by technology, especially Internet enabled apps.

(2)

"The worldwide Ethernet switch market, which had grown in large part due to the adoption of 10 Gigabit Ethernet technology in the data center, contracted in the third quarter, with revenue dropping 4.4 percent, according to analysts with IDC." [eweek]

(3)

Survey Finds 'Death of the Landline' as Most Disruptive Force to US-based Communication Services. I would have to agree. That copper plant impacts a lot of telecom.

(4)

"According to a recent market study made by Infonetics Research, the third quarter of 2012 saw a few positive changes in the leading business PBX telephony systems. Cisco was found to be the leading PBX business phone system vendor (for the 5th straight quarter), followed closely behind by Avaya." [source]

"the high roller in the Unified Comminications (UC) market is Mcrosoft, with a rise in revenues of approximately 40% over second quarter profits." You have to read it carefully. It's just about revenue growth. Diane Myers continues: “UC applications have been a real sweet spot. The demand for tools that aid employee productivity and flexibility is fueling growth in this segment, and Microsoft’s Lync has been the primary beneficiary, enjoying over 40% sequential growth in the third quarter.”

"Revenue is declining at a faster rate than shipments: for the first time, the average revenue per PBX line slipped below $200." This is globally in the whole IP-PBX space.

(5)

Frost & Sullivan's new report "North American VoIP Access and SIP Trunking Services Market 2012: Broader Market Acceptance Drives Robust Growth" to their offering. This couldn't be more obvious. SIP Trunking and VoIP are growing. No kidding. The PSTN is closing and copper is clipping. Cable Voice is all VoIP, even the PRI's. Try to buy a TDM PRI sometime, Frost & Sullivan. Oh, and there was consolidation in this space in 2011. See what I mean?

(6)

Garrett Smith on the video conferencing market.

(7)

Lastly, a beautiful infographic from GigaOm on the state of the US Broadband market!

The $14 Billion Dollar Announcement

2012-12-03T18:09:34Z

While I don't agree with everything that Bruce writes here about AT&T's $14 Billion network spend in the next 3 years, there were a few take aways.

The big one is that the ILEC's have been getting rate hikes for years to pay for fiber that most customers are not receiving. FiOS is where it is - and that's the end of that project. U-Verse is fiber to the node and that isn't deployed everywhere either.

Mike Powell, former FCC Chair and now CEO of NCTA, has often gotten in woefully wrong in presenting the state of telecom. You can talk about top speeds all day long, but that isn't what the Majority of US addresses have access to nor is it the top speed broadband even remotely affordable for consumers - and even some small businesses (at $300 per month). The average US broadband speed is 6.6 Mbps. And if you don't bundle that broadband, it costs a lot.

Despite the promises and the rate hikes, telcos have invested $249 per person on average for broadband per year. Consumers spend on average $529 on broadband annually. At a retail job at $10 per hour that is one week's pay. Unsustainable!

62% of Americans buy broadband. That is all. Period. The market is flat.

Verizon and AT&T have a plan to disconnect the copper plant. VZ has already done so in the shade of Storm Sandy at the battery Park CO. All the CLEC customers out of the CO are out of luck, time and competition.

Telcos are basically unregulated at the state level - and the FCC is useless when it comes to enforcement and competition.

The point that everyone misses is this: our economy in America is service based. It is broadband fueled too - ask Apple or Amazon or Google.

Without cheap, fast Internet everywhere, what happens to that economy?

Clipping copper is detrimental to not only the CLEC's but to the majority of small businesses in the US. Ethernet-over-copper is quick to deploy and gives a great MB for the buck. EoC is the last stand against the cableco becoming the ILEC and the ILEC becoming irrelevant. (I laugh when the stock pickers only point to the dividend as if that was somehow any indication if a telco will tank or not.)

Promises from the RBOCs - Verizon and AT&T - for rate hikes or mergers have largely gone unenforced. The $14B announcement was just PR - spin. Nothing either company does is good for the economy, it is just good for them - for now.

How will Cloud services take off if the broadband is too expensive, unreliable or unavailable?

How will the Internet-centric economy stay competitive in that same environment? How does any of that withstand broadband caps and metering? How do corporations have more tele-workers in that same scenario?

The New Job Marketplace

2012-10-16T00:25:47Z

Jobvite has a slide deck about the future of work. Bigger companies are not creating the same amount of jobs - or the same kind of jobs. Technology replaced a lot of workers, even some salespeople.

The 3 C's - Consolidation, Cloud, (global) Competition - are eliminating jobs by the tens of thousands - ask CenturyLink, Verizon, Cisco, HP.

Think about Apple with its 43,000 employees. It has created how many jobs in its ecosystem, though? For iOS developers, Apple accessories, iPhone repair and factory workers in China.

Many jobs today weren't even around ten years ago. Think SEO, social media and even RubyonRails programmers.

Technology is replacing some jobs and creating others.

More and more people are turning freelance. How do I know? Personal experience. Quite a few folks laid off in Tampa Bay turned to freelance work. vCoder, PeoplePerHour, guru.com, eLance, etsy and so many other sites that are marketplaces for people to sell their skills. I'm not saying that is a reason for the low unemployment numbers, but I know quite a few folks that had to hang a shingle to eat. Add to that more anecdotal evidence in my talk on Advice for Freelancers at BarCamp Tampa Bay on Saturday. Quite a few in the audience are just starting to go freelance from a W-2 employment.

TechCrunch has an article about the new jobs in the new economy. So the Internet (and the technology surrounding it) disrupts newspapers, magazines, book publishing, music, movies, and more, but we didn't think that it would also disrupt hiring, jobs, and how people make a living as well?

The Fall of the CLECs

2012-10-04T18:18:28Z

With the T1 market being overrun by the cable companies, CLEC's are struggling to find footing. They need to go cloud, but are struggling. It is times like this when they wish they had a brand.

Branding would help them with the next step - or a Vision. However, when you spend all your time selling commodities by saving customers money, the raise to zero eventually arrives. Someone comes along who owns the network - Layer 1 - and who can beat you in a price war (and still profit).

It is in this identity crisis that the CLEC market turns to cloud. They are going about this in the same willy-nilly way they have done everything else. No idea what the customer wants or what their sales force can sell.

The fact that the CLEC's are mainly Bell-Heads trying to sell Net-Head stuff is the other issue. Cloud isn't replacement services. It is Productivity, Efficiency, Business Improvement, Smarter Conversations, mobility, flexibility - and yes even Outcomes, Larry and Dave.

The fact that you are telling the Channel to change, while you continue on your merry way with the exact same folks is chilling and ironic. Why aren't any of you hiring from oracle, SAP, Microsoft??? Instead of Speakeasy and CLEC ABC???

Windstream bought PAETEC, which bought MacLeod, USLEC and CavTel, to no avail. Hmmm.

CenturyLink is picking off tw telecom.

EarthLink and Cbeyond are in the process of re-invention. No results yet, but the road is a long one. Hopefully, they have the runway.

That runway gets shorter as Comcast rolls out Hosted PBX nationwide and to the Channel. Then add Cox and Charter to the mix and it gets even harder for the Channel's favorite players.

When you look at Level3, you see integration issues and massive debt. Sunit Patel is Harry Potter to the Voldemort of debt that they are facing as revenues slip. Comcast is eyeballing Level3, not just for network or government contracts, but the streaming live sports (to mesh with Comcast's NBCU and TV Anywhere) and the CDN to all of the top web destinations. I feel sorry for Netflix and the VoIP Providers. Netflix would have its biggest competitor as its network "partner". OUCH! Level3 probably does VoIP services for 80+% of the industry. The ripple is that bandwidth.com is one of the larger L3 customers and servcies Google Voice and Skype. Do you see the butterfly wings here?

If Level3 comes off the map, the disruption to the CLEC, VoIP and Video world is huge. And it would occur at a time when there is already chaos and growing pains.

I think Patel is tired of holding back the black hordes of death/debt. It might be time for a drastic move like BK or acquisition.

The question then for the Channel is What do you do now? Cloud for sure.

The question for the CLEC's that remain are How do you maneuver through this mess?

So much of telecom is built on shifting sands. By that I mean, minutes come and go, so does bandwidth. There is always someone who will sell it cheaper. No Brands were built. No clear differentiation was made. The fall is coming. It made be three years out, but can you refill your revenue buckets in 3 years? Start now.

Final note, the CCA made a comment in a meeting this morning, the Millennials think that Microsoft, Apple or Google are their service providers. To an extent that is true despite the network bill coming from ATT/VZW. If Microsoft adds Skype/Lync to everything, what does that do to the network providers? Utilities -- unless they own it all and meter the heck out of it. Harry's wand can't get you out of this one.

Brad Thor's Black List

2012-09-04T18:30:26Z

I like spy novels. Since James Bond, I have been reading spy novels from Ludlum, Lustbader and Jack Higgins. The new breed of authors in this gnre are very good - Barry Eisler, Vince Flynn, Daniel Silva, Brian Haig, Randy Wayne White and David Hagberg. When I was reading Richard Clarke's novels, it was said that sometimes you get more truth in fiction than non-fiction. Sometimes I don't know where the fiction ends. This is certainly true in Brad Thor's latest book, Black List.

Thor has a list of books and articles that point to Total Surveillance on his website. After 9/11, the US starting giving away liberty in the pursuit of security theater - and we as Americans stopped questioning our government. Everything has been turned into two things: It is in the interest of National Security or Aren't you a Patriot?

Thor drops a remark about the US being in a permanently renewed state of emergency since 9/11. (I can't confirm it.) Then the comment about why no one questions GPS in all devices despite the fact that the DoD (Dept. of Defense) owns the GPS system. We even give up privacy and freedom for convenience. OnStar is lojack, cell phone and GPS in one -- tracked by your car! Google has a profile on every user, predicting your every move. And.... Google voice = Free voiceprint recognition for NSA. Facebook tracks you even when you log off!

Every Breath You Take, Every Move You Make - 14 New Ways That The Government Is Watching You. I won't be sleeping this week. This stuff terrifies me, because the people in DC scare me. They are dim, not doing their job, and owned by the very people they are supposed to protect citizens from. Oh, and Power Hungry! Because who is watching the NSA?

The RNC 2012 in Tampa was just another chance for DHS (Homeland Security) to try out its latest toys as well as its power in making protestors irrelevant. Let's not forget about the drones, being launched from 63 sites.

What does this have to do with telecom? Well, a couple of things, including the Kill Switch, cell phones and the digital splitters.

The whole AT&T was tapped by the NSA never received the outrage I thought it would. Citizens have turned into sheople. In fact, one might say that the lost war on drugs, the crappy education system, the increased poverty, and even the use of social gaming (using gay marriage to deflect from real issues for example) - are all just ways to keep the masses under control. Tapping the Internet backbone at core POP's certainly helps the NSA and the Total Information Awareness project collect every website, tweet, email, and like you send over the TCP/IP. Then you get the power structure of AT&T, Facebook and Google to collect even more data per individual and hand it over.

Here is the funny part of the book - oh, wait, not funny, frightening - at any time, with all that data, you can be labeled a terrorist and poof! gone. No rights under the Patriot Act and other edicts. They can kill you without a trial.

One thing that the Powers That Be learned from Arab Spring is that they need a Kill Switch for the Internet. Too much free thought on those inter-tubes. Open communication can give way to resistance. The Congress Critters would gladly sign that bill just for some more dough to run for re-election, since most of them know nothing about the Internet (except for Weiner's weiner).

The PTB even have the Cell phone companies profiling, logging and tracking your every move through that smartphone with GPS and a hundred leaky apps! It has become a revenue stream for the cellcos - they charge per wiretap! [Remember AT&T, Sprint and T-Mobile were using CarrierIQ?]

Prediction engines are almost to the point of turning the US into the Minority Report! - closer and closer to thought police. I'm going to finish Brad Thor's book and figure out how to diminish my online footprint.

Ask yourself this: Why does an FBI agent's laptop have 12 million Apple ID's on it?

3 Lessons From Radio Shack

2012-09-04T14:42:49Z

Before a plane ride, if I am out of books to read, I run to B&N. The last two trips have been a waste of time. One trip the sales clerk asked me what I was looking for, but they were out of stock on two of the books, but offered to order it online for me. Lately sales is about "Is it in stock, because I want it now."

This weekend I decided to buy a Roku. I should have just either ordered it at Roku.com or Amazon. But No. I like to buy from brick-and-mortar of I can. I try to buy from Sears when I can because they support the military so much. Sears doesn't make it easy to give them money. Their website is horrible. The only Roku I found was from some third party supplier. I wanted to buy it and pick it up at the store. Not possible.

I remembered that Radio Shack had them in stock, so I surfed over to RadioShack.com. The local store had inventory. I clicked on ship to store, which I thought meant store pick-up. Wrong! I paid for it online, printed out the receipt and went to the store. The clerk said and the FB CSR wrote, "Peter- We are sorry to hear this. Since our .com is separate from an actual RadioShack store, if you made a purchase from our RadioShack.com website, and decide to later purchase the item at the store, you would have to either wait until the item is shipped to the store, or cancel the order and purchase the item from the store."

Well, you can't cancel orders online according to the website (when you check order status): "After you have clicked "Send My Order," your order begins to process and you cannot cancel or change your order.*" Apparently, I didn't know that nor did the Facebook CSR nor the store clerk.

ON FB, "Unfortunately, our inventory systems are not fully integrated at this time, which makes it a bit difficult. It's actually something that we're actively working on, to avoid giving customers frustrating experiences like the one you described. -Ricky" Not solving my issue or anything, just explaining that I ordered wrong.

This is why Amazon is beating everyone - Best Buy, B&N, Radio Shack, everyone. One click. BOOM! it's done. Great communication. You know when it shipped, when it is likely to arrive. If you buy from Amazon as a Prime member you can get it in 2 days for free.

Lesson 1: Communication is key to everything in sales. The web allows for great explanation via pages, videos, email, tweets, etc. Use that limitless, free space to explain clearly what is being bought and how. Customer Expectations is integral to customer satisfaction.

Lesson 2: Don't explain policy! Solve the customer issue! You cannot retain a customer by quoting policy.

I want to buy from you. You are parroting policy to me over and over -- and twice the action suggested (cancel it) was wrong. Help me give you money so I can have my Roku.

Lesson 3: Make It Easy to Buy from you. It should be as easy as Amazon, but I understand why it might not be that easy.

By setting up proper customer expectations with clear communications, you won't have to explain policy to a customer. Instead you will have let the customer know exactly how the sales and delivery will proceed, so that both of you get what you want.

What's Happening?

2012-08-24T20:34:01Z

Broadview Networks filed bankruptcy, albeit a pre-packaged debt reduction plan.

CenturyLink and Mediacom join the broadband cap club. Mediacom has a low end cap of 150 GB. Ouch! For cable companies, metering and caps are about preserving the TV money, but telcos should be cap free.

Are you a Start-up? Pitch your company at StartupCamp in Austin!

President's Club contests are popping up. Microcorp has recruited 6 carriers - M5, Level3, Comcast, EarthLink, Cbeyond, ACC Business - to help Agents qualify for the trip. WTG just announced their first President's Club destination: Puerto Rico. And Telepacific has a President's Club, too.

FCC's 8th Broadband Progress Report is out. About 30% of the US population does not purchase fixed line broadband - but they may get broadband at work or via 3G. Only 6% are stranded on dial-up, so I am having a hard time swallowing all the money that CenturyLink, Frontier and Fairpoint are getting in federal funds to build out - at approximately $775 per user!!

EarthLink's customer profile according to Mike Toplisek: "In large part, they would fit into the range of five employees up to 1,000 employees. Probably 95% of that customer base fits in that size."

The Economist has an article about OTT (over-the-top) VoIP apps and their effect on mobile operators.

The FCC approved the sale of SpectrumCo spectrum to VZW. There were a few restrictions on the joint marketing venture between the two.

FCC Suspends Special Access Rules, Will Collect Data To Modernize Them.

Comcast Hits 300MB

2012-07-25T19:34:32Z

Comcast rolled out Xfinity Platinum service with speeds of 305Mbps down and 65Mbps up for about $295. It was designed to compete with VZ Quantum FiOS, which is 300Mbps down, 65Mbps up, and $205 per month in the Northeast. Xfinity Platinum will include free Xfinity Signature Support (27/4 tech support and a personal consultant), a secure wireless gateway, and the Constant Guard Security Suite.

In some areas Comcast is doubling the speed for its existing tiers. This will make selling T1's - and in some cases Metro Ethernet - very challenging for agents and sales folks. 300x65 is less than $300 - a T1 is a measly 1.5x1.5 for $300-$600. Talking about "Dedicated bandwidth" will only work if the cable system (or FiOS) in that area experiences congestion and/or outages.

Even if the customer only had throughput of 100x15 for that $300, a 10x10 Metro E costs three times that. Certainly, business class, SLA and other factors can be contributing to the negotiation, but it is getting more difficult.

Broadband has cannibalized DIA (dedicated Internet access) offerings. No wonder all the talk is about MPLS and private cloud; these services have not commoditized YET. Coming soon though.

Strategy Matters

2012-07-24T15:26:53Z

"When everyone is playing the same game, your execution is critical." - Seth Godin

"the way you go to market, the structure of your offering, the model of your business--these are sufficient to cause you to lose, regardless of how you play the game."

It's like he was talking about telecom, the ultimate me-too industry. It is even me-too in service delivery - which means it largely sucks.

On reason telecom is stuck is due to the personnel. This industry just recycles staff. The same people doing the same thing just under a different logo for years. That would be fine, but we are missing risk-takers. By risk I mean, trying new stuff - new services, new marketing, new support.

Some will claim that Cloud is new, but it isn't. Hosting and the ASP (application service provider) model have been aroundfor over 10 years. Marketing just put some lipstick on that pig.

As the copper plant sunsets, CLECs and other service providers are going have to re-adjust their strategies - from relying on the ILEC network to something else. This is where Innovation and Creativity will be needed - and where me-too thinking will be a death nell. [Need help with this? Call RAD-INFO INC. at 813-963-5884 .... this is what we do for service providers - with a 13 year track record.]